This got a little long when I was writing it as a comment to Chuck Wendig’s blog post over at Terribleminds. So, if you want a little foundation,read here first.
I recently purchased the new NOFX album. They were selling the CD for $8 on their website. I was at the mall, Hot Topic had it for $8.99. I got it there. It was convenient and cheap. I had a talk with my wife on the way home, so I didn’t listen to it. I checked, the FYE was asking $8.99.
I got home, and I downloaded the whole thing. My car stereo, my biggest source of music, has a USB port. Carrying an 8gb USB flash drive is far easier than carrying the hundred plus CDs it can store.
Why didn’t I just download the album legally? I thought about it. I went to Amazon. Amazon wanted $9.99. iTunes wanted $9.99, and I was afraid Apple might raid my house or sue me. I’m not paying $10 for the digital version of something I just bought legitimately for $8. That would be stupid.
NOFX has declared that their albums are going to be sold in the $8 range for the foreseeable future. Why? Because they feel it’s fair. A CD only costs a dollar or two to manufacture. The albums cost about $40,000~ to record and produce. After all that’s said and done, they make a good living selling their work at that range, and they don’t feel they need more to keep making great music. In short, they’re not pissing on us and telling us they need the money to stay afloat.
In contrast, if I look for something from even similarly-sized indie labels, FYE is asking $14.99-$19.99. Those labels use the same distribution. Often, these labels share producers. They share sound engineers. You ask them, “Why so expensive?” They’ll give convoluted, abstract answers about how piracy hurts their sales, why it’s so expensive to market CDs, why blah, blah, blah.
- First off, don’t punish me, the consumer, for piracy. I’m trying to give you money. Slapping me in the face because someone downloads your shit, that’s just terrible.
- Second off, bullshit.
Greedy people need to make money off of creative people. With major releases, a number of people have to become wealthy from them, or they don’t happen. When Lady Gaga releases an album, executives that don’t even know one of her songs have to make millions on their investments, or they won’t back another album. Maybe piracy’s hurting art. Maybe. However, as far as I’m concerned, greed is hurting art. I’m not paying twice the amount for something, just because a bunch of businesspeople want to get rich off it.
I’m a creative professional. If you know me, you know I’m releasing a game called Maschine Zeit in the very near future. In preorders, I’ve exceeded my budget. I’m still going strong with them. Why? A few reasons. One: I’m offering a product that people think is cool. People think it’s cool because I think it’s cool, and because I stand by it. Two: I’m giving additional value that can’t be offered in a PDF. I’m allowing participants to be personally involved in the process. I’m giving them ways to become invested in the company and the work.
I want money. I really do. I’m making it. I feel that if I’m passionate and hardworking, I will continue to make it. I am aware of the fact thatsome people will download my game. Are they thieves? Fuck no. They’re potentially devoted fans at best. Somewhere in between, they might buy a product, or they might post a review. Awesome! At worst, they’re not really costing me anything. I am not losing a copy of the book. If they weren’t going to buy it, that download isn’t going to change anything. If they thought about buying it, but only had $5 in their budget, and the game was $10, I’m still not losing anything. That downloader is still a person. They still deserve a modicum of respect, particularly since they haven’t cost me anything. I’m not going to burn bridges with a hateful attitude. I’m not going to send cease and desist letters. Because down the line, that person might buy something from the guy that wasn’t a total dick to them.
I’ll let you in on a little secret. Back in 1995, a friend of mine had this really cool book called “Vampire the Masquerade.” He loaned me a copy. I couldn’t find it anywhere, this was before the advent of the internet and I was 13 and not quite as resourceful as I am now. The book wasn’t readily available to me, so I took a few dollars to the local library and I photocopied damned near the entire thing. I was an evil pirate, and I destroyed publishing. Now, those Vampire the Masquerade guys delivered quality stuff. I loved it. So, when I had the chance, I started buying their shit. That didn’t stop. I did a little mental math. Since 1995, I’ve purchased over 300 products by White Wolf. I’ve been a member of their paid fan club for eight years. This is numerous thousands of dollars in product. Had White Wolf talked shit on me for copying that book when I did, I wouldn’t have done that.
On the NOFX kick, I’ve purchased over 20 of their CDs. I’ve paid to go to numerous live shows. When I was younger, my friends and I taped their stuff and distributed it amongst each other. We ripped our CDs and copied them to CDRs when that technology became available. If they called me a thief, I would have called them assholes. I wouldn’t buy their product.
In summation: Charge a reasonable amount for your product. Create good shit. Connect with people. Be passionate about what you’re doing. If you’re doing those things, you probably don’t have a lot of time to whine and moan about people stealing your stuff. However, if you’re one of the many people that a) doesn’t create, b) doesn’t connect with people, c) have a passion for the product, and d) understand reasonable pricing, you probably have plenty of time to decry theft. If you’re not doing those things, maybe you should reassess your career in creative endeavors, because you’re an artifact of a time we’re leaving behind. I won’t miss you.
April 29th, 2010 - 12:21 pm
Nicely said.
Don’t have much more to add, really.
– c.
April 29th, 2010 - 12:30 pm
I completely agree with you. I’ve done my share, but as an adult, I’ve made an effort to support artists. Example, you. Also local Dallas artist Shock of Pleasure (excellent trip-hop). So this week when a local band (Warbeast) released a new album, I was shocked it wasn’t available online. Kind of pissed about it. I would have bought it on Tuesday. But it is only available in stores. I’m not making a special trip for that.
I bust my ass coming up with ways to engage clients. I work hard on keeping my skills updated and staying current with market trends. Why are publishers, studios, and record companies exempt from that?
April 29th, 2010 - 12:35 pm
You want to know my answer? Completely candid?
Rich guy privilege.
They feel it’s their right to throw money at things and see a return. They’re finding more and more every day that they’re becoming obsolete, that the internet is helping creatives connect with their audiences directly.
Trent Reznor is making far MORE money now, and selling fewer albums. Funny how that works, right? It’s because a bunch of old, out-of-touch rich men aren’t getting their take. The worst part is, those rich men have convinced a number of otherwise intellectual people that they have a right to the public’s money.
April 29th, 2010 - 12:37 pm
Fantastically put.
When I do my weekly bit, I tack on the Creative Commons stuff at the end for a couple of reasons, neither of which has to do with piracy. I’m sure people out there are downloading the audio portion and I’m cool with that. However, I don’t want anybody suing my ass over using their material, and I think that rapid-fire ‘fine print’ like that at the end of an audio recording is funny to some people when done properly.
April 29th, 2010 - 1:36 pm
Josh — Creative Commons doesn’t protect you using other ppl’s work, btw (unless I’m reading you wrong). — c.
April 30th, 2010 - 4:52 am
[...] It’s a sane model. It covers expenses and it assures that at the bare minimum the creator is comfortably covered against losses, at least in theory. By the way, check out David’s thoughts about piracy. [...]
April 30th, 2010 - 9:43 am
Entertainment Piracy is so horrible and deplorable that it actually caused growth in 13 markets for 2009.
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/04/piracy-problems-music-industry-grew-in-13-markets-in-2009.ars
Here is what I do, and how I get music. I hear a song on the radio or from a friend or however. If I like it, I research the artist, and look for more work from them. I buy a CD, if the CD was as good as everything else I found, I then Rip it to my NAS. However! I own over 400 cd’s, most date back to my very first ever CD which was the Akira OST that came out in like 91. Anyone with CD’s knows that they are not tough, they get brittle, scratched, and after a time even become transparent from wear.
So I go to various sites, and Download those albums. It makes literally ZERO sense to me to have to pay twice for music.
For books, video games and Movies, I do the same thing. I have a huge collection of PDF’s of game books, and everyone of them has a twin in print on my Bookcase or boxed away. I have a copy of Privateer Presses Lock and Load (I actually have two), my son when he was 2, spilled my coffee all over it, as soon as PP made a PDF of it, I grabbed it from a torrent site.
My Starcraft CD’s are so scratched and jacked that they are unreadable, however I still have my CD key and battlenet account, so I grabbed a torrent recently of the game, made new CD’s and put them with the originals.
There has been a new practice in Blu-Rays, that I would LOVE to see transfer over into other areas, the first time I came across it was with the Sherlock Holmes Blu-ray.
For 5$ more at walmart, I bought a blu-ray, a DVD, AND an electronic copy of the movie for download. Just one little code, I plug it in at a website and bam! Why can’t we do this with Game books, or Music, or video Games (yes I know about steam)?
(Paizo and a few others are starting and I buy everything I can to support them on this)
I guarantee that if more start doing this, Piracy will go down, because everyone I know out there that pirates is much like I am.
//soapbox off
April 30th, 2010 - 9:49 am
Bart:
I know Machine Age will be packaging PDFs. Not in a direct sense, but if you demonstrate that you bought a hardcover, you’ve got a PDF. If a customer gets their local game store to order their copy, I’ll give them the PDF immediately so they don’t have to wait.
You’ll also notice that I’m experimenting with formats. PDF is far from the ideal for digital. That’s why I’m doing a Maschine Zeit wiki. I figure that’s more convenient for players. It’s optimized content. As well, I’m not sure if you saw them, but I’m packaging the digital release all on a 1gb USB flash drive. This way, if someone wants to pirate, that’s cool. But the flash drive can’t reasonably be pirated. That’s a cool little perk for people invested in the work.
April 30th, 2010 - 9:55 am
David:
Yea man, we have talked about the Thumb drives and PDF’s a few times.
Just like the Wiki and everything else. I honestly feel that your handling this far better than say WOTC or WW does on most things. You seem far more Player Friendly.
also – Whenever I am able to get back to Enkraos and getting it published I plan on following in your footsteps.
April 30th, 2010 - 9:57 am
Keep me informed. I’ll see what I can’t do to help make that happen. IE: I could see making it work with Machine Age if you were savvy to that.
I knew you knew about the digital formats. Blog comments are sufficiently out in the open that I need to frame them for the public though
May 6th, 2010 - 5:40 am
I’m confused. You legally bought the album, then you illegally downloaded a digital version? Why not just rip the album CD you already had to MP3 format? Have they introduced a new law in the last few years that makes that illegal to do now? Last I checked, it was permissable to rip CDs you owned so long as you owned them and didn’t go selling either the CD or the copies?
May 6th, 2010 - 7:33 am
Ash:
Because since the last time I’ve ripped a CD, I’ve gotten a new PC and don’t have any software for it. I’d have to download the software, install it, open the CD, put it in the drive, wait for the rip, and then put the files where I wanted. It was just easier to download it. Also: The band has stated they were okay with it. So, it was convenient.
The CD is still sitting on my desk, unopened.
That said, the RIAA has been known to sue people for ripping CDs: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/28/AR2007122800693.html The case cited there, the RIAA sued the person that ripped CDs for personal use for over nine grand per track.
June 24th, 2010 - 3:44 pm
That was exactly what I was looking for. You have done a wonderful job communicating your message. Keep up the good work.